A Christmas Surprise
by angelofnight
Summary: The Opera was not all ... time passed ... and Christine and Erik each recieve a final gift for Christmas.


A/N: You won't need to guess who's house this is. Based on Susan Kay.  
  
  
  
A Christmas Surprise  
  
It was snowing outside of the small house that had become her home, in the past three years since Raoul had pulled Christine from the cellars of the Paris Opera House, for the last time. Three years since she had given Erik that searing kiss which had revealed to her - too late - just how very much she had truly loved him. It had been three years of healing, and coming to terms with her life as it now was. Not that it was even remotely unhappy. Raoul had married Christine only a month after those events, and she hadn't protested. However much she'd loved Erik, she did still love Raoul deeply. She'd still wanted to be his wife - even if, in secret, she hadn't wished to be his nearly as much as she'd wished to be Erik's.  
  
In those three years, Raoul had done everything to please her. He'd even purchased them a small cottage in the country, which would keep them safe from the jaded life wealth often provided. It had taken time for him to get used to doing things for himself, such as chopping firewood, and even dressing himself. Still, he had seen how happy it made her. It was a small sacrifice if it made her smile.  
  
Now, it was Christmas Eve, and they were sitting together in the parlor, lighting the candles on their finely decorated tree. He was dressed in black silk slacks, and a red overcoat with gold cufflinks. Christine herself was dressed in a purple satin dress with pearls on the collar and cuffs, which shimmered with hints of silver whenever the candle's shone on it. There was a fine little collection of gifts beneath the tree, which they planned to start opening that very evening. It was all planned. They would each open one that night, and then open the rest when they came home from Mass the following morning.  
  
Neither of them had expected the soft knocks that came to the door just as the final candle was lit on the tree.  
  
"Who on earth could that be in weather like this?" Raoul wondered aloud, shaking out the igniter he'd used on the candles. Christine was already headed to the door. "It's practically a blizzard out there!"  
  
"Oh, Raoul." She chuckled, pausing to look at him with shining eyes filled with adoration. "I don't think you've ever seen a real blizzard. You should have seen some of the bigger winters back in Sweden."  
  
"You mean it gets worse than this?" He asked in mock horror, making her laugh again, such a sweet bell-like sound as she finally reached the door in the foyer, and slid back the bolt.  
  
"Good evening?" She called out into the darkness. The light from the front hall gave her no sign of anyone outside. Curious, she pulled the door fully open, until the full winter chill struck her. There was no one outside. Yet upon further inspection, she realized something had been placed on the doorstep. Crouching down, she inspected a card on a gift- wrapped package that had her name on it. "Curious." She murmured, picking it up and bringing it back inside, locking the door behind her.  
  
"Who is it, Cherie?" Raoul called, throwing another log onto the fire in the parlor.  
  
"It was no one." She called truthfully, sitting on the front steps in the foyer, and pulling a scarlet ribbon from the package. After that, she only had to lift off the shimmering green top to the box to look inside.  
  
It was a music box that she well remembered. Yet the only one like it she'd ever heard of, had been left in Erik's home. Swallowing thickly as she lifted it carefully from the box, she glanced under it to see another note. It had three very simple words on them.  
  
I love you.  
  
"Erik . . ." She breathed, her throat tightening painfully. Placing the music box quickly back into the package, she replaced the top, and put the box onto the step beside her. Standing swiftly, she reached for her coat by the door, and threw it over her shoulders before hurrying outside. The door closed behind her completely, and she looked through the snowy darkness anxiously. "Erik?"  
  
"Merry Christmas, Christine . . ." His soft voice rang delightfully in her ears, and she whirled to see him standing by the window looking into the parlor. He stood just as she'd always remembered him, clothed entirely in black with the exception of his silk dress shirt, and the mask covering his face. Yet his cloak had been replaced. What he wore was flimsy and old, and surely couldn't be protecting him from the freezing winds. "I was hoping to see you open your gift."  
  
"It is beautiful, Erik." She told him, tears stinging her eyes. It was so wonderful to see him again. She moved towards him quickly, but he held up both hands to keep her away. "Erik! I've missed you so much! How did you find me here?"  
  
He simply watched her for a long time.  
  
"Your husband may not know this . . . but when I learned he was seeing a realtor, I advised the man he was employing to find you a house about this one. This is . . . where I grew up."  
  
Christine's eyes grew wide once more, and she lifted her eyes to stare at the house. They stood in silence for a long moment. Obviously, Erik seemed to wish her to overcome her state of stunned disbelief. When she finally looked at him, all she could do was nod.  
  
"Then you've given me an even greater gift than the music box." She told him. "You're alive. It's more than I could have wished for."  
  
"It's the only reason I showed myself." He told her. "I could see the news plagued you. I didn't wish to be responsible for your quiet grief any longer."  
  
"Erik, where is your cloak? Aren't you freezing?" She moved towards him again, but he backed away insistently, pressing his back up against the outer wall of the house.  
  
"I must go." He told her softly. "Raoul must never know I was here."  
  
"He thinks you're dead. Of course he'll never know." Christine looked through the parlor window briefly. She could see he was still poking at the fire, and re-arranging things about the room to make it look perfect for Christmas day. She even saw him sneak something into her stocking by the fireplace. It almost made her smirk. Yet she looked back at Erik quickly. "Erik, I love you."  
  
The words had simply tumbled out of her mouth, unstoppable. She was powerless to restrain them, or deny them. It was something she hadn't told him before, and now that she had been given a second chance, she knew she had to take it. She heard the sharp intake of breath, and watched as he almost reached for her. Still, Erik restrained himself.  
  
"That is the greatest gift I ever could have received." He finally whispered, bowing slightly. "Good-bye, Christine."  
  
"Erik! Wait!" She insisted, reaching out to take his arm as he began to brush by her. "Please . . . will you wait here for me? Just for a moment? Please, Erik? Please?"  
  
He stared down at her. She seemed so desperate. For a moment, he could only stare at her, and nothing more. Yet finally, he nodded his acquiescence, and stood in a patient, waiting pose. Christine nodded in return and turned to hurry back inside, slamming the door behind her as she barreled up the front steps and to her wardrobe. When she came down carrying a black cloak of thick velvet material, lined with faux fur. Something had made her buy it months before. It had been an impulse, and Raoul had thought her quite silly for buying a men's cloak for herself, yet now she thought she understood what hand had been guiding her that day.  
  
"Christine?" Raoul was standing at the bottom of the stairs, staring at her in confusion. "Who was out there? Who is out there? What's going on?"  
  
"Oh, my dearest . . ." She paused then, smiling brilliantly, and touching his hand in comfort. She thought up the best lie she could for that moment. "Don't worry about it. It's only a transient man in need of warmth. I'm going to give him my coat."  
  
He looked at her uncertainly, and then nodded in acceptance. Turning, he caught glimpse of the package she'd left on the steps. He motioned towards it questioningly, and she shrugged.  
  
"Meg sent it to me." She said quickly. "I thought to put it under the tree tonight. I got it two days ago, but it's been sitting upstairs. I don't know why I haven't brought it down already."  
  
"Shall I put it under the tree, then?" He asked her. He hadn't failed to notice the package had already been opened once, yet he couldn't blame his wife for being excited about a gift from a friend who was now so far away.  
  
"Yes." She agreed, thinking that if worse came to worse, she could come downstairs in the morning, and throw away the note inside the box before Raoul saw it. "Yes, go ahead and do that." Then, she hurried outside again.  
  
Erik was not where she had left him, and she looked around worriedly. Had he decided not to stay, after all? Where could he have gone? She began wandering the property in hopes that perhaps he'd be hiding somewhere. It was possibly someone had walked by the house and spooked him into hiding from them.  
  
She found him behind the house, staring down at a patch of dead grass he'd cleared of snow with his bare hands. She looked down at it in confusion, and then up at him. He was silent, and she saw how his shoulders quaked. She realized he was weeping quietly. Why, she did not know, but she dare not ask.  
  
"Erik?"  
  
He turned sharply, startled, and she held the coat out to him slowly. When he saw it, his eyes rose to meet hers again. The snow was falling around them in gentle drifts, and the cold was starting to seep through her dress. Christine couldn't even begin to imagine what the cold was doing to him.  
  
"Here, Erik." She insisted. "It's my Christmas gift to you."  
  
Slowly, he reached out and accepted it, putting it on slowly. Oddly enough, it fit as though it had been made just for his tall size. Christine had been right to buy it. Finally, he reached out to clasp her cold hands in his, and bring them swiftly to his lips.  
  
"Christine, remember that I love you, and that this is what is best." He pleaded softly. "I couldn't bare it if you lived the rest of your life thinking you'd made a mistake."  
  
"The only mistake I made was never telling you how I felt." She breathed.  
  
"Now that you've told me, that mistake has been fixed." He soothed, kissing her fingertips as though trying to warm them. "Go inside now, before you catch your death of cold."  
  
She broke away from him and started to back away, to go back into the house the way she'd come. It was so difficult leaving him out in the cold snow like that. Why was she being forced to leave him again? She loved him more than she loved Raoul. How could he make her do this?  
  
What she didn't know was that it was the last Christmas Erik was ever going to see. She didn't know that what she'd given him was going to be the only Christmas present he had ever, or would ever, receive.  
  
As she stepped back into the house, Raoul greeted her with a cup of steaming tea with honey. He'd pulled their sheepskin rug closer to the fireplace so they could sit on it together near the flames. Although he seemed to be burning from the inside out with curiosity about the person who'd been outside, he didn't ask her a single question. He trusted that his wife would hold no secrets from him. She trusted him just as much.  
  
So . . . there would be no secrets. Erik would be nothing more in Raoul's mind than a homeless wanderer to whom his wife had given a winder coat, inspired by the holiday season, and the warmth in her heart. 


End file.
